This 7-element 28mm f/2.8 AI was Nikon's most popular wide angle lens from 1974-1981. It's sharp, fast and works great on film and FX cameras. Compared to iffy zooms like the 24-120mm VR, this old lens has far superior optics, and is a stop faster.

The manual-focus 28mm f/2.8 AI works great with most Nikon cameras, film and digital.

It works flawlessly with every manual focus Nikon ever made, from the F of 1959 through the FM3a and today's FM-10.

On the D3, D700, D300, D200, D2 and F6, use the "Non-CPU Lens Data" menu option to set 28mm and f/2.8 to get full matrix metering, EXIF data and finder read-out of set aperture. It works great in aperture-preferred as well as manual modes on these cameras.

The meters of cheaper digital (D80 and below) and cheaper film cameras (N80 and below) will not couple (or work at all) with this lens, so you'll be on your own guessing exposure using the rear LCD or an external meter.

It works perfectly every professional film camera (F, F2, F3, F4, F5, F6), and adds Matrix metering on the FA, F4 and F6.

1960-1986: Nikon's first 28mm SLR lens was the 28mm f/3.5. It had 6 elements in 6 groups. Nikon redesigned its optics in 1977. It came in all flavors from non-AI through AI-s. Many of the older 1960-1977 lenses have been updated to AI for use on modern cameras.

Manual focus is a dream. Nikon's trademark, all it takes is one fingertip to focus. It has no play, it's as smooth as silk, and slides fast since it's not gummed-up with grease that third party lenses use to hide their sloppy workmanship.

Its fast f/2.8 aperture makes it sharp and bright with manual focus cameras.

The D3, D700, F4, F6 and most professional AF cameras have three very precise electronic manual focus indicators.

Lesser digital cameras, like the D300 and down, usually have just one "OK" focus dot, which is not as precise as two arrows and a dot.

Coma is when bright points of light in the corners turn into blobs. These happen with fast and wide lenses at large apertures. Coma goes away as stopped down, and tends not to be seen in slower and tele lenses. Coma is an artifact of spherical aberration, and is one of the things that's often cleared-up when a lens uses aspherical elements.

The 28 2.8 AI has just a little bit of coma wide-open in the corners of the full FX frame. It won't have any on DX cameras, since their corners are still in the middle of the FX frame (see crop factor).

Here are examples on FX. Please note that a complete print at the same magnification as the cropped images will be 42" (1.1m) wide!

Full-Frame FX Guide Image. Crops are the red box on lower left.

At f/2.8.

At f/4.

At f/5.6.

This is great performance. Other lenses, especially those nasty third-party 28 f/2.8s, look much worse.

The 28mm f/2.8 AI has no visible distortion at normal distances. It has a bit of barrel (bulging) distortion jammed in your face at one foot (30cm).

It can be eliminated by plugging these figures into Photoshop CS2's
lens distortion filter. These aren't facts or specifications, they are the results of my research that requires hours of photography and calculations on the resulting data.

Falloff, for real photographs on FX, is minimal at f/2.8 and invisible otherwise.

I've exaggerated this by shooting a gray field and placing these on a gray background.

Nikon 28mm f/2.8 AI falloff on FX and film at infinity.

f/2.8

f/4

f/5.6

f/8

There is a slight cooling of color balance in the corners on FX. This comes from the effects of the coatings when light hits them at different angles. The coatings' most effective wavelengths change with the angle of incidence.

To wake up any ghosts, you need to have the disk of the mid-day sun in the image and overexpose enough to see into large shadows. If you do this, you'll see some big green disks wide open, and smaller, brighter ones stopped-down.

I can't see any ghosts where it's important, which are in night photos with bright city lights in them.

Like all Nikkor manual focus AI lenses, the Nikon 28mm f/2.8 AI is built to the highest mechanical standards of any lens ever made.

Barrel Exterior: Anodized and enameled aluminum.

Filter Threads: Anodized aluminum.

HN-2 Hood: Threaded anodized aluminum (optional).

Focus Ring: Metal, rubber covered.

Focus Helicoids: Feels like brass: smooth and silky with no play or need for damping grease.

Depth-of-Field Scale: Engraved into barrel and filled with different colors of paint.

Internals: Metal.

Aperture Ring: Cast aluminum, anodized and enameled. Engraved markings filled with different colors of paint coded to the depth-of-field scale.

Mount: Dull-chromed brass.

Markings: Engraved into the metal and filled with paint.

Identity and Serial Number: On the front of the focus ring, engraved into the metal and filled with paint. Oddly, both samples I've seen look like an identity ring fell off the inside of the filter ring. There is a shiny black, blank, flat ring between the glass and filter threads. Not to worry, this is the way the lens is supposed to be.

Ass-Gasket (dust seal at mount): No.

Noises When Shaken: Mild clicking from the diaphragm blades and actuation system.

Optically, the old 28mm f/2.8 AI lens makes the new 24-120 VR look like a toy. This old lens is much, much sharper, probably enough to be visible on the sides of even reasonably-sized prints from FX or film.

Of course the VR lens autofocuses with modern cameras and has vibration reduction for hand-holding in dim light, but the AI lens is almost a stop faster anyway.

The old AI lens looks great wide-open at f/2.8, while the new VR lens looks awful at 28mm wide-open.

The VR lens is loaded with distortion at 28mm, while the old AI lens has no visible distortion.

The older AI lens has a slightly shorter actual focal length, at infinity. Its focus is geared faster than the AI version.

The older AI lens is slightly less sharp at f/2.8 for astronomy, and, on a D3, very, very slightly less sharp overall. I'd never see this difference if I hadn't shot the same landscapes at infinity and compared them by switching between images on the same screen; I'd never see this in stand-alone shots, or even in two huge prints side-by-side.

The older lens has slightly less falloff at f/2.8, but is slightly sharper in the corners at f/2.8.

I'd pitch the flat Nikon cap that came with this lens new, and get a new 52mm "pinch" type cap . The new fatter caps are much easier to use in the field, and if you use a hood, can be put on and off without having to touch the hood.

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